What sucks, who sucks and you suck

Thoughts on the GF1

2012-06-28

So, a few months on, how has my cunning camera plan worked out?
I eBay’ed my FE2 (for a pittance), my Bessa L and the 15mm Heliar (for
about what I paid for them - rangefinder gear does not lose its value) and
bought a very nice secondhand, boxed GF1 from Ffordes. I also purchased a
cheap but well-made Nikkor to m4/3 lens adapter from eBay and a new
Panasonic 20mm/1.8 lens from Park Cameras. Recently, I added one of the
Panasonic 14mm/2.5 lenses that is currently being split off from the
discontinued GF3 kits and sold cheap by various eBay sellers.

The GF1 is a nice, compact camera that is reasonably easy to use. I
don’t love it and it doesn’t give me the same warm glow as using my old
EM, but then I’ve reached the conclusion that I’m unlikely ever to
replicate that experience with digital kit. There are simply too many
functions and buttons complicating the presentation to ever allow you to
embrace a digital camera in that way. The goal is supposed to be
making rewarding images, and developing some kind of fetishistic
relationship with the gear is just the icing on the cake.

Size- and weight-wise, it compares well with the EM. The 20mm lens seems a
little chunkier than I’d have expected but is also very light. The 14mm is
much smaller and more in keeping with the compact aesthetic. But overall,
it’s no problem to carry around the camera and both lenses in a
small holster pouch all day.

In operation, the GF1 is reasonably simple to use once you have read the
manual and set the camera up as required. So far, I’ve only used aperture
priority mode, setting the aperture via the thumbwheel and dialling in small
compensation adjustments by pressing again on the same thumbwheel. You do
need to watch the display while doing this, and I haven’t yet trained my
fingers to always move the dial in the correct direction to narrow or
widen the aperture as required (in fact, I consistently move it the wrong
way on each first attempt). Very occasionally, I use the Quick Menu button
to change the default ‘film’ look, but it doesn’t make any difference to
the end result as I shoot raw. Indeed, the ability to view the LCD in
monochrome but take a colour shot is one of the features I always wanted
on my Nikon DSLR.

This reliance on only a few controls is a blessing, as Panasonic’s menu
system is fairly opaque and the number of buttons on the rear only serve
to complicate the interface. The GF1 is still seen as “better” by degrees
than its successors because of the direct access to functionality provided
by these buttons, but I’d say that’s a mixed blessing. What you want,
ideally, is direct mechanical access to the two or three items you adjust
most often, together with some sort of visual and tactile feedback. So
yes, you want dials but what you really want are traditional aperture
and ISO dials, not computer controls. In that sense, the GF1 is merely a
least worst option compared to other compact cameras. This is a prime case
of being careful what you wish for: yes, the GF1 has direct button access
to ISO and White Balance, but it also has three different menu buttons, a
focus mode selector and an overloaded thumbpad. Rather than offering a
clear, transparent interface to the camera, this complexity serves only to
obfusticate it. (Interestingly, the Shutterbug review I just referenced
for a rear view of the camera reckons “there are just enough buttons to be
functional, yet not intimidating”. The reviewer is clearly suffering from
Stockholm syndrome after using too many digital cameras.) Yet when people
complained that the GF1’s successors lacked sufficient manual controls,
what they really meant is that Panasonic took away the wrong buttons.
Interestingly, the GX1 simply reinstates them in a slightly different
layout, apparently without bothering to consider whether some optimisation
was possible.

After taking a shot, there is a configurable review period but, as far as
I am aware, no way to immediately delete the shot at this stage.
To clean up your shot history on the go, you’ll need to drop into the
full image review mode and negotiate the flexible but somewhat awkward
frame deletion dialogue (which you always have to switch from “No” to
“Yes” to delete even a single image, making the whole process about as
time-consuming as possible).

The GF1 supports ISO up to 3200 and an auto ISO setting. However, auto ISO
is only effectively enabled if you set an upper limit to the range
(otherwise it will top out at ISO 400 by default). And the highest upper
limit you can set is … ISO 1600. So 3200 remains only a manual option,
which you could view as a safety feature given the accompanying noise, or
as an annoying limitation.

For output, I transfer 12MP raw files from the memory card, each of which
contains a smaller (roughly quarter-size) JPEG preview that conveys the
picture settings used at the time of shooting. (I believe the chosen frame
crop also applies to the raw file, so you can’t shoot square frames and
later change your mind.) A major disappointment here is that orientation
data is only added to images shot with an OIS-capable lens (i.e. not the
primes). Would it have been too much trouble to integrate the same tilt
detector that even basic compacts and phones possess, Panasonic? (This is
the kind of annoying detail often left out of reviews, and is
something I will check the GX1 specs for should I decide to upgrade.) Be
prepared to spend some time rotating your portrait images in the editor,
or settle for shooting square pictures all the time.
Also, bear in mind that the in-camera picture settings only apply to JPEGs
so you’ll still need to apply any mono conversions to the raw files
(AfterShotPro, at least, lacks the ability to use any picture settings in
the metadata as a default suggestion).

I’m not going to comment on image quality, as I don’t pixel-peep. The
images look fine to me. I’m sure there are many cameras, particularly
later models, that produce better results but these seem perfectly
acceptable for my purposes.

Overall, I find the GF1 pleasant to carry but marginally less pleasant to
use. Composing and shooting via the rear LCD is still not something to
which I can fully acclimatise; I’ve pondered the accessory EVF, which gets
mixed but notably positive reviews on Amazon, but I haven’t yet
sufficiently committed to spend the money. The apologetic thumbwheel falls
just short of a truly comfortable control method, the plethora of damn
buttons can never be quite put out of one’s mind and the absence of a
quick way to delete images is just irritating enough to be hard to ignore.
However, if you can put all this aside for a few minutes and simply keep
pressing the shutter, it’s a great camera and the results are fine indeed.
If I had more time to spend taking images, I would probably increase my
investment in m4/3 and look to upgrade to a later variant, complete with
EVF, that would hopefully address my current peeves.